Horizon Support Advisors

[PostalOfficer]

I presume everybody has had the email advertising these posts?

Anyone got any thoughts about it? Been on the counter just about all my career and never travelled round. After this Christmas and imminent duty cuts, just feel like I need to get out of the office for a while. One of my colleagues who did a similar job with the original Horizon system said with was a rubbish job, just going round sorting out problems caused by the more stupid members of our profession.

Just thinking I am pretty good at communicating with people, interested in computers...and it would be something interesting to write on my CV when we all get the sack in 2011

[Running Man]

Hi Postal Officer.

Having read the job description I reckon it could be an ideal way for you to do a valuable job for POL and get yourself away from the pressure cooker atmosphere of the Crown Office network.

What's the worst that can happen? You can't possibly be in a worse PO job than you are now and you simply go back at the end of the project having bought yourself some breathing space.

The difficulty I see for anybody who is interested in these jobs is in Crown Office Managers being able to release those interested people. That's another story!

Totally agree with your 2011 comment and I'm really looking forward to my EVR package when our 'five year plan' proves to have been totally worthless (if we last that long).

Good Luck and keep us posted.

[PostalOfficer]

Thanks for the thoughts, RunningMan.

Reinforces some of the ideas I was having; a way of trying something something different whilst still keeping my old job, unlike trying something outside the P.O.

Probably given a shove in the right direction by another awful day at Rorkes Drift B.O.

Asked my B.M. if he was okay with me applying and he was supportive, so will probably give it a go.

[The BFO]

I have not seen this e-mail – but I’m not surprised, our Branch Manager would not know how to cope with losing someone on secondment – best to keep it secret.

Is there a guarantee that you will return to your previous job at the end of it?

[PostalOfficer]

I have not seen this e-mail – but I’m not surprised, our Branch Manager would not know how to cope with losing someone on secondment – best to keep it secret.

Is there a guarantee that you will return to your previous job at the end of it?

email subject read "ACTION REQUIRED Horizon Online Recruitment", printout dated 18/12.
'Nil Returns' are required, so your boss should have done something with it!

It contains the phrase "Crown Office colleagues will return to their parent branch after the project".

My information is that on this ocassion they just want to borrow staff rather than recruit them permanently to the project so that there is something to do with them at the end of the project rather than having a body of people with no other job to go to.

[PostalOfficer]

Decided to give it a go. Had a word with my BM on Christmas Eve; said he was waiting to see another member of staff this week who had expressed an interest before he sent the applications in. Keep you posted.

I think the final deciding factor was him coming off a conference call and saying the the passport checking duty would have to do everything short of taking a baseball bat to customers to persuade them to buy currency etc. All sorts of figures banded about regarding targets. LET ME OUT OF HERE Used to enjoy checking them and picking up some credit cards.

[The BFO]

the passport checking duty would have to do everything short of taking a baseball bat to customers to persuade them to buy currency etc.

Excellent, and a jolly good idea - where does one obtain such an implement?

In my last office we had a sheet of paper in the tub with the passport paraphernalia that we were supposed to tick to show we had mentioned everything.

I used to hide it at the bottom amongst all the crap…

[PostalOfficer]

Got taken on. Two days training at Birmingham next week.

Bit of an adventure as after 28 years of serving on only 3 counters I head into the big wide world of travelling around.

[Running Man]

Congratulations and well done Mr. Postal Officer.
I really hope you make the most of your time away from the madhouse that is the 2010 Crown Office! Sorry!! That's an insult to madhouses and I do apologise because I'm sure they are run much better than Crown Offices and don't have umpteen conference calls each day!
Please keep us posted on how it's going and try to forget the crap that's thrown at us every day on the counter.
Good Luck.
(Reckon you might need some sales coaching if you're away too long!)

[PostalOfficer]

(Reckon you might need some sales coaching if you're away too long!)

Very true, but there again all the sales coaching I've had hasn't done any good yet!

Done the course. Quite interesting and rather exciting being away from the coal face for two days!

Couple of points I picked up: Do not assume Horizon Online will be faster, if it is it's a bonus. Those of you in Crown offices may wish to note that you are doing the migration yourselves, so do read the plasticky checklist carefully when it comes. There is a definite time by which you have to start migration on the appointed day, do not leave it until that time in case one of the computer's check fails and you don't have time to have another go.

[PostalOfficer]

Is there a guarantee that you will return to your previous job at the end of it?

There's something about this in section 4.4 of the document referenced in the thread "Integration of retail sales hours..."; I'm working on an English translation at the moment.

Off on deployment next week. Rather further from base than expected. Given an oppurtunity to back out, but, apart from wanting to get started, I really didn't think I could do with the alternative to another week at Rorke's Drift BO. Come to think of it I think Rorke's Drift was better manned than we are. Feel a bit of a rotter leaving my mates to fight on short-handed.

[Running Man]

Thanks for the update and enjoy your first week 'on the road'.
Try not to worry about the team you're leaving behind; you're doing an important job and it sounds like you've earned the chance to 'break free' for a while after all those years of service.
Are you sure you will be able to cope with not asking every single customer every single day if he or she would like a car or home insurance quote?
Do you have a get out clause if you miss the excitement of selling at the counter?
Seriously though, one word; ENJOY!!!!
Keep us posted.

[PostalOfficer]

Are you sure you will be able to cope with not asking every single customer every single day if he or she would like a car or home insurance quote?

It'll be tough, but I'll try

Trip next week cancelled. Looks like they are getting the bugs out of the system before it's released! That will be a nice change from normal PO procedure

[PostalOfficer]

Had a couple of weeks of on/off/on. Like a coiled spring wanting to get stuck in then it gets postponed when something goes wrong with the pilot. At least they seem to be addressing problems before they do a full scale roll-out and let the front line staff struggle. A nice change.

If any of you have received the training pack this week, beware as some have been sent out with some of the contents missing - notably the 3 workbooks. You should have had a Memoview. If so make sure you get these 3 books as they are a good intro.

Good news from the one office I did migrate. After a few niggles of trying to find buttons on the new screen layout etc., they reported they were quite pleased and told me it rolled over quicker on Wed. What used to be smartpost seems better, payment by card for bulk postings is MUCH quicker and postage labels seem a bit quicker printing. Had a couple of problems, but that's what a pilot programme is meant to find.

Meanwhile with the slack I've been sent out to drum up sales for the data capture campaign. Yes, that's me who is usually in the bosses office on a charge for not selling enough. Oh dear, I signed up for this to do computers, not sales Going to flog some programmers at fujitsu to make them get it working quicker

[PostalOfficer]

This is more like it.

Sent round some crown offices to give them a taster and some background on Horizon Online and have just returned from my first solo office migration.